Politicians of all parties are at risk of stereotyping women during the current election campaign, the Fawcett Society has said.

A report published by the equality campaign group on Thursday said that key issues for women were being left off the agenda.

It said that there has been little or no mention of action to tackle the gender pay gap, even though a woman earns just 82 pence per hour for every £1 earned by a man.

Out of every 100 rape cases reported to the police, just six result in a conviction.

And while 98 in 100 men qualify for the full state pension, only 13 per cent of women do.

"To deliver equality between women and men, politicians must be bolder," said the report.

"They must stop seeing childcare as 'the women's issue'.

"While Fawcett welcomes that childcare and maternity pay has been given a higher profile in this election campaign, politicians should stop equating women's concerns so narrowly with children.

"By talking about maternity pay and not paternity pay and by targeting women and not men with their childcare reforms, politicians risk reinforcing stereotypes of women's role that have long been a barrier to gender equality."

The Fawcett Society said that only the Liberal Democrats, and to a lesser extent the Conservatives, and addressed the issue of women's pensions.

"Positive changes to childcare provision and maternity leave are welcome," said director Katherine Rake.

"But politicians have to understand that women's lives are about more than children and if gender equality is to be achieved they will need to be much, much bolder.

"We are calling for urgent action on the continuing gender pay gap, female pensioner poverty and violence against women."